Altruistic Aaliyah announced another amazing abroad adventure- an aim Aunt Aretha almost assuredly adopted as an adolescent, and although an afflicted, attenuated amygdala accelerated active aggressions, Aretha assented assertively and affectionately, alternating allegories associating Atheism and archaeological artifacts abundant around Antigua, albeit arbitrarily; an arcane awareness about adopting archaic Austrian aesthetics and attire; and anecdotes admonishing authority as an alacritous, adroit Anarchist at an amiable and ambitious age, ascending austerity and approaching an authentic audacity audible around all authoritative, avarice Aristocrats, and Aaliyah, abnormally acquiescent, adamantly agreed ameliorating agrarian atrocities and advocating against adversity across Africa alleviated Aaliyah’s Anglo abasement.

In the abode of silence therein,

Duelled a soul, longing to scream.

A body its containment,

Enslaved to will of the mind.

Many wars alike,

Are fought on the fronts of one's conscious;

Where rebellious desires confront,

Rational suppressions lead by the mind.

Battling to be set free,

Choking on its own misery,

Breathlessly insisting,

The spirit ached with imprisonment.

Heart and soul joined hands;

"Beware the brothers in arms.."

The cries echoed, growing louder

The mind's trumpets diminished awhile.

Hammers and sledges drilled through the skull,

Every effort to break chains still.

Only then was there light,

Seeping in through skin.

An army so tender,

Hypnotically determined

To war against melancholy:

To tame vivid morbidness.

~Maaza; collaborative work with BleedingVeins

I resolve to dig deeper

to see sun’s dance,

watch shadows frolic

and murmur my name,

grasp bare threads

and weave them together,

quench thirst with

crystal streams

of thought,

rise above binding arms -

throw unkept resolutions

into the blackness

of cheerless minds,

unearth my place

in my own existence,

understand truth of colors

and paint new dimensions,

become the breeze

kneeling in images

of reflection,

encompass beams

of healing light,

run swiftly

along path

of spirituality,

polish my worth

like diamond dust.

I will glide blithely

in translucent words

of no reality -

may they flow

forever, in life

of gossamer dreams.

There was a woman I knew, Eliza. She did everything she could to avoid leaving her DNA behind. I had to travel with her for work a few times. She was a real nice lady in her 50s. She grew up in a normal home with a normal family in a normal town. For some reason she had this crippling fear that she would leave pieces of herself behind. She brought her own towels and sheets and pillow cases whenever she spent the night away from home. When she cleaned her hairbrush she took every last strand and would set them on fire. That is until the time the smoke alarm went off at the Day’s Inn Schenectady. She stopped lighting crap on fire and started to flush the hair down the toilet. Only then she worried that not all of it would flush away and she'd spent an hour in the can flushing the toilet over and over again, pouring in 2 cups of bleach before every push of the lever.

I was surprised when she met a man. He was one of those guys who was neither hideous nor good looking which suited her just fine. I don’t know where they met but I came to find out that he had this thing where he refused to leave his trash outside the building like everyone else. He would get on the train and go 2 or 3 stops away and toss it in public waste bins. He thought his neighbors might go through his trash and know his business. Not that there was any business to know. He spent most of his time figuring out where to toss his trash and dealing with Eliza’s DNA hysteria. I got used to it after a while and we became close friends before they disappeared back in 2004. I miss them a lot. They were good people.

I went on a few dates with this sexy little man with a mustache and great dance moves. His name was Edgar. I liked him well enough. He was a serious guy but when we danced it was like magic. He just knew how to boogie. On the 3rd or 4th date I got all gussied up because we were going to a supper club to rumba. When he picked me up he slapped me across the face because I was wearing lipstick. After he recovered from my pushing him down the stairs he told me that covering my lips with vulgar paint hides the true color of the lips. The lips on a woman’s face is a mirror image of her downstairs parts (he used the word “pussy,” but I am a lady and don’t use such language). He told me painting my lips meant I was ashamed of my pink palace and he could not be with someone who was that uptight. Well, I was happy to part ways with him. And for the record, my hooha does not look the same as my face lips; it’s way prettier and I am glad he never had the chance to see it.

Strange folks have come and gone over the years. I guess we are all a little strange in our own ways. That’s what makes us interesting. Me? I’m pretty normal. I eat raw ground beef from time to time. And instead of saying “um” I do a scale of “la la la la la la la.” That puts people off sometimes but I've learned to control that compulsion for the most part unless I am really nervous. I also never wear matching socks. I figure one of the pair will inevitably be lost so I am just being proactive. Other than that, I am pretty ordinary.

The day I met Nate was a day I will never forget. All friends start out as strangers. My 3rd grade teacher said that to me when I was shy and didn’t want to talk to anyone. It stuck with me all these years. I was sitting in Union Square Park, minding my business eating rice cakes with almond butter and watching the people when this enormous creature plopped down next to me. He was at least 6 foot 7 and about 600 lbs. A big bloop of a guy, as my dad would have said. He had a kind, round, hairless face. He started talking to me right off the bat. I remember giving him the side-eye at first but was soon drawn into a lively conversation about the color blue and the various shades and how blue can also be an emotion and we just sat there for hours talking about the color blue. Later that night I walked home and I thought about Nate. I thought about him a lot and how he would never slap me for wearing lipstick. I know, I set my standards high but that was the bar I had to measure against.

We met the next day and talked about kitchen utensils. All the different kinds and what they are used for and debated whether wooden spoons were better than a metal ladle or a silicone spatula. I was fascinated with his knowledge of different kitchen tools and his enthusiasm was contagious. He was very orderly with the topics he chose to talk about and he rarely deviated from the theme, but when we did, he would hold up one finger and say “hold just one minute” and switch gears. When he was ready to go back to the original topic he’d say “resume.” It was easy to follow his transitions and he had a laugh like a bird in a gully.

Every day we met up and talked for hours about various things. Squares, how they can be so many things to so many people and that people used to call nerds squares. We talked about olives and the varieties from the ones stuffed with almonds to tapenades and oils and beauty products made with olive oil, but also that olive was used to describe skin tones. On Wednesdays we talked about specific body parts.

Nate was the kindest, funniest man I ever met. We fell in love. Ain’t that something? And while it’s true that every friend starts off a stranger, it is also true you can never really know anyone. You only know what they let you know. I found out on our wedding night that he cried after sex. Not just tears of release but weeping and wailing cries. This really worried me the first few times but then I got used to it. It still made me uncomfortable, just like it made him uneasy when I ate raw meat, but we learned to live with it.

A year after we were married I caught him in the park talking to a pretty little thing. I hid in the bushes behind them and listened as they spoke about the color blue. She was just as captivated as I had been not so long ago. Reality was a blur. Was it really happening or was I seeing a memory from outside of myself? How could my gentle giant run the same scam on another woman? Why was I not enough? My heart thumped inside my chest with irregular hammering beats against my ribs; my face flushed hot and my eyes filled with water.

When Nate got home that night I told him what I’d seen and he didn’t deny it. The girl he was talking to, a blond of all things, was named Rose. And she understood him. And he wanted to be with her. So I left.

You find out someone is a stranger but they are really just like everyone else. Clichéd assholes. I did some sleuthing on Rose. Turns out she had webbed feet and an elongated coccyx bone which looked like a little tail. She was a frog-rabbit. She did freaky webcam sex stuff. There's a market out there for everything, I suppose. A tail and webbed feet? I could never compete with that. And I’m not sure I want to.

It's fine. Now I just stick to myself. Life is complicated enough with the people you know, or think you know. My sister likes to watch those YouTube videos of women whispering nonsense and scratching their scalp. Strange, but she’s no stranger. After Nate, there were no more strangers for me. I’m happy this way. I can't help but think about Eliza's obsession with leaving some of herself behind. She took it to a literal level with the DNA part, but the truth is, as we gather more of ourselves we inevitably lose bits too.

I am the mother, the father, the child

I am the peace, the tension, the bile.

I am the earth you inhabit, consume

I am the air you inhale and pollute.

I am the water you poisoned then drank.

I am the moon you close your eyes to, 

the sun to which you awake.

I am the blood and the heart and the veins

I am the numbness, the pleasure and pain.

I am your wounds that fester and plague

I am the kiss that sucks it away.

Your love is tough

Still in my heart

Your eyes

...

Your voice

...

In my thoughts

My thoughts fighting

My tears hiding

For your love still

In my heart

Still in my heart

Happiness fading

Sorrow feeding

Love beating

So hard...so hard

Your love is tough

Burning my heart

Your love is tough

.....Screaming.....

In my heart

So hard...so hard

Your love is tough 

The stranger knocked upon the door,

A creaking, wooden throb,

And someone on the other side

Unlatched and turned the knob.

Uncertainty, a soft, "Hello,"

And, "May I use your phone?"

The person on the other side

Appeared to be alone.

An observation taken in,

No pictures on the wall.

He pointed somewhere down the way-

"Go on and make a call."

The thunder boomed; the stranger stalled

As wires were cut instead.

The gentleman began to sense

A subtle hint of dread.

A conversation thus ensued-

"So what has brought you out?

The rain has flooded everything,

And wiped away the drought.

Say, did you walk, or did you drive?

Why don't I take your coat?"

The stranger slowly moved his arms,

A sentimental gloat.

The water from the pouring skies

Enveloped cloth and shoe.

"Say, would you like a place to sleep?

I'll leave it up to you."

The person on the other side

Discarded his mistrust.

The stranger said his tire was flat,

And shed the muddy crust.

"The phone won't work," he also said.

"It could just be the storm.

Perhaps I will stay here tonight,

To keep me safe and warm."

The patron of the house agreed.

He hadn't seen the wire.

The chilly dampness prompted him

To quickly build a fire.

"You have a name? They call me Ed.

My wife was Verna Dean.

She passed away five years ago

And left me here as seen.

I guess it's really not so bad.

We never had a child.

I loved that Verna awful much,"

He said and sadly smiled.

"No property to divvy up.

The bank will get it all.

Say, do you want to try again

To go and make that call?"

The stranger grinned and left the flame

As to the phone he strode.

Within his pocket, knives and twine

In hiding seemed to goad.

A plan was formed- he'd kill the man;

Eviscerate him whole.

The twine would keep him firmly held;

The knife would steal his soul.

A lusty surge erupted hence;

A wicked bit of sin.

The stranger hadn't noticed yet

That someone else came in.

About the time a shadow fell,

He spun to meet a pan.

The room around him faded out

As eyes looked on a man.

A day or two it seemed had passed,

And when he woke all tied,

The stranger gazed upon old Ed

Who simply said, "You lied."

Reversing thoughts, the moment fled

And Ed said in a lean,

"No worries, stranger. None at all.

Hey, look, here's Verna Dean!"

He looked upon a wraith in rage;

It seemed his little lie

Combusted in a burning fit-

He didn't want to die.

So many victims in his life,

Some fifty bodies strewn.

And now he was the victim; now

The pain to him was known.

The stranger fought against the twine,

And noticed by his bed

The knife once in his pocket left

A trail of something red.

A bowl filled full of organs sat

As Verna poured some salt.

She exited with all of them.

"You know, this is your fault.

We demons wait for just the day

The guilty take the bait

And play with matches one last time-

I simply cannot wait

To taste the death within your flesh;

The venom in your gut.

So now you know the way they felt-

Hey, you've got quite a cut!"

The person on the other side

Removed his human skin-

Before his wife came back for more,

He offered with a grin:

"Say, stranger, is there anything

You'd like to say at all?"

I looked at all the blood and said,

"I'd like to make that call ... "

River follows dreams

flecks of foam dribble down chin

fish kiss sea’s wet mouth

guiding water to ocean

watercolors in the stream.